Thomas Lane Sentenced to 2 and a Half Years Behind Bars for Violating George Floyd’s Constitutional Rights

Thomas Lane, a former Minneapolis police officer, was sentenced on Thursday following his conviction of violating George Floyd’s constitutional rights.

The federal civil rights charge sentencing, per a report from the Associated Press, saw U.S. District Judge Paul Magnuson handing down a sentence of two and a half years in prison. Notably, this is lower than what prosecutors had requested.

Citing federal precedent, prosecutors had previously called for Lane to be given a sentence of as much as six and a half years behind bars. A lawyer for Lane, however, had pushed back against the recommendation by arguing that their client wasn’t as “culpable” as the other officers involved in Floyd’s murder.

In February, three ex-officers—Tou Thao, J. Alexander Kueng, and Lane—were convicted on federal civil rights violations. Thao and Kueng were convicted of having “deprived [George Floyd] of his constitutional right to be free from an officer’s unreasonable force” by not intervening on Derek Chauvin, who in June received a federal sentence of his own of 21 years.

Meanwhile, Lane was convicted of having “deprived Mr. Floyd of his constitutional right to be free from a police officer’s deliberate indifference to his serious medical needs” by not providing aid. Thao and Kueng were also convicted on that count.

To be clear, this is all separate from state charges against the officers. Lane, who is set to be sentenced at the state level in September, pleaded guilty back in May to a manslaughter-related charge in connection with Floyd’s murder. As part of a plea agreement, a charge of aiding and abetting second-degree unintentional murder was dismissed.